liberal appropriations by national and state governments, and are assisted and co-operated with by the United States Department of Agriculture. This Department was established in 1862 as a Bureau, under direction of a commissioner. In 1889 Congress enacted a law making it an executive department of the government, under direction of a secretary to be appointed by the president and to be a member of his cabinet. In 1862 Congress also passed the Land-Grant Act, donating public lands to the states and territories providing colleges for the benefit of agriculture and the mechanic arts, which has resulted in the establishment of such institutions in every state and territory. The Hatch Act of 1887 gave $15,000 a year for the maintenance of each agricultural experiment station, for experimentation, investigation and the reporting of results. The value of these stations as agencies for the advancement of agriculture through scientific research was early demonstrated, and in 1906 Congress passed the Adams Act, which has for its object the extension and strengthening of the experimental work of the stations by additional appropriations. By provision of this act the initial appropriation of $5,000 is to be increased each year until 1911, when it will amount to $15,000, making then and thereafter annually available an aggregate of $30,000 of government funds for each station, under the Hatch and Adams Acts.
Labor-Saving Implements—Transportation. It is a far cry from the old-time forked stick for stirring the ground to the modern steam plow that turns sixteen or more furrows at a time, or from the flail to the twentieth-century thrashing machine, but these improved implements have been brought to their present perfection in comparatively recent times, and to Americans belongs the distinction of first providing farm implements of the greatest labor-saving and time-saving qualities. The invention of those adapted to the requirements of the American farmers has been a potent factor in developing the country’s agriculture. Eli Whitney’s cotton gin was the first of these wonderful contributions; Charles Newbold and Jethro Wood were probably the first to fashion the plow of modern times; and Cyrus H. McCormick made the first successful reaper. Until better means of transportation were provided by railways there were comparatively few settlements away from the seaboard or the navigable rivers. Transcontinental railways, by making markets available, have brought remote areas within the pale of profitable agriculture, incidentally quickening a widespread interest in the improvement of country roads, and modern machinery has in large measure solved the next problem caused by the sparse population in proportion to area—that of labor. The acreage of arable land yet uncultivated is vast, the greater proportion, of course, being in the states west of the Mississippi River; much of that previously regarded as barren is being brought into a high state of productivity by systems of irrigation, and much is being accomplished in this line also through a better understanding of climate and soils, the adoption of methods of tillage best adapted to them, and the introduction of plants found more suitable. It is claimed by engineers that under the operation of the National Irrigation Act of 1902, 100,000,000 of acres of practically arid lands now useless may be reclaimed for agricultural and home-making purposes.
Crop Distribution and Development. Climate and soil determine the kind of crops raised; for instance, the farmers of some portions of the southern states found theirs especially adapted to cotton and tobacco; others found theirs peculiarly suited to corn, and especially was this the case in the Mississippi Valley states; the great wheat-growing region is further north in the middle states, and semi-tropical fruits are grown throughout the south.
Something of the country’s rapid development may be gathered from the fact that the yield of corn in 1910 in the United States was more than twice as much as was produced in 1875. In 1874 the country assumed first rank as a wheat-producer, surpassing France in an aggregate yield of 308,102,700 bushels. In 1901 the yield was 119 million bushels more than double that quantity.
In quantity and value our agricultural productions exceed those of any other class. Sixty years ago the United States produced insufficient breadstuffs to supply home demands, but now is the largest exporter of breadstuffs and other kindred products. American agriculture rivals that of all Europe in the aggregate of its yields, and with a continued growth in population, the consequent decreased areas in individual farms and their better cultivation, a far greater production seems inevitable.
Exports. Millions of acres of fresh land have come into production faster than domestic consumption required; this necessitated finding markets elsewhere for their surplus products, and much of America’s prosperity is due to her export trade. In providing export commodities the farms overshadow all other sources. Not only this, but the farms support the manufactures of the country by supplying the raw material. For the year ending June, 1910, the value of farm products exported reached $933.000,000, the largest by any country. Of this the live-stock products constituted no small proportion. The annual shipments of our cattle and sheep to foreign ports are estimated in the hundreds of thousands, and dressed meats in millions of pounds. The leading export-product is cotton, the quantity exported in 1910 amounting to 3,206,708,226
